On Tuesday, Frank X. Shaw, the corporate vice president of corporate communications at Microsoft, made the first official mention of Windows Blue in a TechNet blog post:

Now, the look ahead. With a remarkable foundation of products in market and a clear view of how we will evolve the company, product leaders across Microsoft are working together on plans to advance our devices and services, a set of plans referred to internally as “Blue.”

While Shaw didn’t disclose exactly which services will be receiving a Blue update—scuttlebutt says Windows 8, Windows RT, Windows Phone 8, Windows Server, and multiple online services are all being targeted for coordinated updates —or even what Blue really is, he does say that a “continuous development cycle is the new normal across Microsoft.”

“Our product groups are also taking a unified planning approach so people get what they want—all of their devices, apps and services working together wherever they are and for whatever they are doing,” Shaw wrote. Indeed, one of the major rumors about Windows Blue is that it will make cross-platform app development easier in some way. If that’s true BUILD 2013 will likely be the place we’ll hear the details.

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